India growth projections marginally downgraded by IMF

Revising its economic outlook, International Monetary Fund (IMF) today marginally brought down India's growth rate projections to 5.6% for this fiscal and 6.3% for the next financial year.

This was slightly lower by 0.2 and 0.1% respectively than the previous forecast released by IMF in its report in April.

Global growth is projected to remain subdued at slightly above 3% in 2013, the same as in 2012, IMF said in its report released on Tuesday.

This is less than forecast in the April 2013 World Economic Outlook (WEO), driven to a large extent by appreciably weaker domestic demand, slower growth in several key emerging market economies and a more protracted recession in the euro area.

'Global growth increased only slightly from an annualised rate of 2.5% in the second half of 2012 to 2.75% in the first quarter of 2013 instead of accelerating further as expected at the time of the April 2013 WEO,' the IMF said.

The multilateral agency said this underperformance was due to three factors-- growth continued to disappoint in major emerging market economies; recession in the euro area was deeper than expected, and the US economy expanded at a weaker pace, as stronger fiscal contraction weighed on improving private demand.